1988 C1500 short box Dually (The Unruly Dually)

[partycampercurtis]

Hey everyone. This is my first post (YAY) so I hope its worth the read. Not sure if there are any other similar projects out there but here is what
I got happening.

About a year or so ago Alisha (my girlfriend) traded her 1987 Fiero for a 1988 C1500. The truck was originally a V6 truck, but someone had already swapped the motor and trans for running gear from an 89 1-ton. It was now wielding a 350 V8 and Turbo 400 trans. The truck was a bit of a rat rod, but mostly just ratty. The interior was complete garbage, to put it nicely. (We later picked up a full interior from a Silverado and have resurrected the interior.) The truck was no gem either, but was basically rust free, aside from the rear fender wells. Its flat black spray bombed paint job forever sealed its fate as a rat rod, but we were always searching for something to take it from ratty truck, to rat rod.

We had toyed with the idea of making it a dually, just for fun, when I had a dead 94 4x4 dually I couldn't get rid of. At the time it was no more than a funny idea, but it did spark an interest to look into it and if it would be doable. Not much information was out there, but i couldn't find anything yet to say it was impossible. A few months later my dually was sold, and I came across a 2wd dually being parted out. I instantly thought back to our crazy build plan, and couldn't resist the opportunity to actually try it. The truck had pretty tall gears (3.42) and with the tall first gear on the Turbo 400 trans, it really made for a slow doggy start. The 4.10 gears of the dually rear end would help make this thing get up and go like it should. The dually fenders fit the bill perfectly too, as the rear fender wells were rusted and needed work anyway. The swap idea seemed to fix two of our problems with the truck, as well as create something cool and unique that would take this poor little C1500 from Ratty to Rat Rod.

Here is the little C1500, Single cab, short box, as she sits right now.




Of course y'all know you wouldn't be seeing this post unless I went ahead and went for those c3500 dually parts... And here they are.

14 bolt full floater rear end with 4.10 gears


Fiberglass dually fenders
https://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/...1&d=1593154702

Got a great deal from Dakota at Black Pearl for all the dually parts;
- 14 Bolt 4.10 rear end
- Dually rims/whats left of tires
- Fiberglass dually fenders
- Front spindles with brakes
- Upper control arm
- 1 ton sway bar

and few other odds and ends from the same parts truck, including the cab lights.

As far as I have seen, this should be all I need to convert the C1500 to a dually. (Not that there is necessarily one way to do it). I will be keeping the 1500 suspension, as the truck wouldn't be legal to tow more anyways since it is still registered as a 1500. A lot of what we like about the dually swap idea is the better traction, so the softer 1500 suspension is going to work in our favor.

Tomorrow we will be starting prep work on and for the dually fenders.